


Freshly Folded

by nowsaguaro



Category: One Day at a Time (TV 2017)
Genre: Alvareider, Caught, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-11-15 18:08:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18078431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowsaguaro/pseuds/nowsaguaro
Summary: “Hey, Pen, there’s a new clean shirt waiting for you in there, and, uh, a pair of clean boxers for uh, for uh the bottom!” He grimaces at his own words.“That’s super weird, but thank you!”





	1. What Exactly Was the Plan

**Author's Note:**

> I own none of these characters.

**_“¿Qué ‘stoy haciendo?!”_ **

Penelope finds herself staring down at a stack of books on the coffee table that are still bringing on that I-NEED-to-rip-out-my-hair buzz in her fingertips even though she’s already slammed through all her finals (and the date of her graduation ceremony is circled and starred on the kitchen calendar.)

She shouldn’t be riding the nausea-panic wave still, but 30 months straight of her spinning one million emotional plates has her frayed at the edges. And, while it’s fantastic to see how the kids have grown into increasingly independent young adults, these next few years –inevitably full of milestones and plan pivots– will definitely be a system shock for her. She needs to not. think.  _ She needs to burn these books!  _

_ - _

It’s Friday afternoon and the kids are still in school, which will flow right into extracurriculars– and Lydia is **blasting** a lesser known Ibrahim Ferrer ballad, no doubt behind that curtain sitting on the pull-out holding her photo of Berto. Penelope is free. There’s nothing to do. No homework, no parenting, no cleaning. She can settle down in a nice robe and drink a glass of wine,  _ granted, in the most noise-polluted self-care day imaginable. _

She visibly jiggles her stress out of her shoulders and hands and sits down on the couch, still in her scrubs.

_ Enter Schneider; commence theatrical eye roll! _

“Hey Pen!” He screams over the music.

“¡Mami!” Penelope screams, “Mami, chill with the volume!” She can’t be sure, but she swears her mom turns the volume  _ up _ a notch. “Ay no puedo con eso hoy,” she grumbles while she pushes Schneider into the hallway so they can talk and–nope, still loud– up to his apartment so they can talk.

* * *

 

“Uhhh… you okay?” Schneider asks, looking down at a very frazzled and buzzing Penelope as they take their classic positions on the couch.

“I just. Agh! I just need a break. I’m no-I’m not saying that I’m still all crumpled in a finals-induced stress ball, but just that I need to lay down in one of those-those-uh–” She mimes a bubble around her.

“Sensory deprivation tank!” Schneider (annoyingly) offers.

“YES! Those! And then I  _ emerge _ ,” Penelope makes a royal motion that only reminds Schneider of that painting of Venus de Milo, “to put on a warm robe and neck pillow and, well, go sleep some more.”

He chuckles at her distressed theatrics but swallows his impulse to correct her idea of how Sens’Dep’s work. “Alright. Problem solving. Compromising…..” He makes a chewing and thoughtful motion even though it’s clear he already has the “IDEA! How about you just have your marathon nap here while I tinker out in the living room?”

She’s already on board but pauses while she tries to imagine what in God’s name he means by  _ ‘tinker’ _ . “Yes, oh my God thank you Schneider!” She leans in and pats his chest while she gets up from the couch, excitedly (the emotional embodiment of static cling).

He, always the social sponge, energetically responds, “and you can wear my house robe and maybe shower–” he whips his head around the room and grabs a stack of luxurious white towels, “and I just folded my guest towels.”

While Schneider’s energy bumps up, Penelope already begins her mental unwinding process. Sometimes she is in awe of how psyched he gets with focused and direct opportunities to support other people. And-oh-he’s pulling her to her feet and guiding her over to the bathroom door.

“You will find guest body wash –it’s  _ Sassy Citrus _ !– in the shower already, and feel free to use any of my other products.” Schneider overcompensates in trying to give her privacy and starts to become uncharacteristically sheepish while he backs out of the room.

“Thank you for all this. And Schneider: if you run into anyone looking for me….  _ don’t tell ‘em I’m here! _ ” She smiles mischievously, sticks out her tongue, and closes the door.

He nods back. Schneider loves shared secrets and, as they say, addicts do make the best liars.

 

\--

About two minutes into hearing the shower run, he considers that Pen might want some clean clothes despite his offer of the robe. Schneider shuffles through his chest of drawers and pulls out a pair of boxers –hmm, we’ll see how she feels about _ that _ – and a gray undershirt and nudges open the bathroom door and snakes his arm around to the inside knob to hang them for her. “Hey, Pen, there’s a new clean shirt waiting for you in there, and, uh, a pair of clean boxers for uh, for uh the  _ bottom _ !” He grimaces at his own words.

“That’s super weird, but thank you!” She echoes out through the shower’s glass walls.

* * *

 

Fifteen minutes later, Penelope emerges from the bathroom with a ballroom gown-like train from his blue silk robe and holding her balled up clothes from the day. She throws them in his wicker hamper and walks out into the living room to show off her refreshed self.

Schneider turns around and assumes she doesn’t know how funny she looks in his tall man clothes. He sees a flash of plaid from the boxers as she walks and he is oddly touched. 

“You have sort of a Cruella de Vil vibe coming off ya right now.” He smiles. She doesn’t.

“Where can I sleep?” She knows where his bedroom is, but feels it safest to double check that she’s allowed in his bed.

He rises to his feet and walks her over. And while she immediately crawls onto his enormous bed, he fluffs a pillow giddily. When she finally has silently reached a sort of open casket funeral-esque serenity, he tosses the pillow over her face and runs out of the room. “Sweet dreams!”

He’s already clicked the bedroom door shut before she has time to react.

* * *

 

Nobody texts Schneider looking for Penelope and her phone never lights up. It’s 5pm now and Alex’s baseball practice and Elena’s –whatever the hell club she’s in– are probably wrapping up. He quietly leaves for Apt. 402 to talk to Lydia. 

“Hola, fabulosa!” He shouts into the (now much quieter) apartment.

Lydia opens the curtains to run to him for a hug and kisses him repeatedly on the pecs, “hola mi novio lindo! I jam ol alon today! ¿Sabes por qué?”

“I know Alex & Elena are busy with afterschool things and our Lupita has to go back to work for after hours filing. She said that she won’t be here in time for dinner and to eat without her,” Schneider supplied, expertly.

“Will my  _ precioso _ be joining us?” She returns to her tight full-body embrace.

Schneider racks his brain; there’s no  _ reason _ why he  _ has _ to be upstairs while she’s asleep. Oh, but he wants to be. “Can’t! I’ve got a little project I’m tinkering with.”

“¿Pero qué es ‘tinkeri’?” She asks, but he chuckles away further interrogation and slinks back upstairs.

\--

He must have opened the door a little loudly because a moment later Penelope steps out of his bedroom.

“Hey.” Her already raspy voice with her added grogginess makes her sound… good.

“Hey,” he replies softly, “just talked to your mom about how you had to stay late at work for, uh, filing? So they’re all going to eat together and you might be able to keep marathoning.” He charms out the last bit.

“She didn’t invite you to stay?”

An evasive maneuver option pops up in his brain but he soldiers on, “She did, I just felt like, I don’t know, being home.” He knows exactly what thread of thought her now awake brain is following from what he says, but she just squints for a moment and moves on.

 

“Should I keep marathoning then?” Penelope asks him, excited to live out this so mildly indulgent dream of hers.

“Yeah, go for it!” He must have a flash of disappointment run across his face because–

“Or we could hang out here and…” she looks around for anything fun at all, “hang out.”

“Or, y’know, I could nap with you.” Hearing himself, he blushes behind his beard.

A giant acidic butterfly rolls over in her stomach.  _ How long has she been silent? _ “Oh! Yeah, I mean it’s your– it’s a big– it’s a big bed.” She opens her eyes wide, wishing self-awareness wasn’t a thing.

He opens his eyes equally wide, and they laugh at how strange this is. “Sorry!” He laughs out, “napping with other people is just very special to me and I’m kinda tired so I just thought–”

 

“No, Schneider, it’s okay,” she’s waves her hand dismissively. “Yes, let’s hang out in there.”  _ PorelamordeDios _ . There’s no way they could share another this-is-so-weird nervous laugh so they both bite the insides of their cheek at how, somehow, Penelope’s wording moved it from intimate into sounding more like a late night code for the ends of dates.  _ Maybe this is a mistake _ .

\--

Penelope rounds the bed while Schneider pulls  _ down his pants? _ “Schneider what are you doing?!”

“Do you expect me to sleep in my Levi’s?”

“Well what  _ are _ you going to sleep in?” She gestures at his body, now just in a tight white undershirt and plaid boxers.

“Pen, I am  _ literally _ wearing clothes from the same pack as you.”

“Well okay! That’s… true,” she notices she is genuinely anxious.  _ Stupid Schneider _ .

They both lay down and shuffle into the sheets.

Schneider thinks: ‘ _ so what really was the plan after this point? Just to sleep? _ ’ He watches her eyes close and a wave of overwhelming joy hits him. ‘ _ How did I get to this point? _ ’

Penelope opens her eye just slightly to get a peak at him. “Schneider!” She hits him on the hip, “why are you staring at me? Go to sleep you weirdo! _Qué bicho raro este hombre oh my God_.” 

He just laughs defensively while she shifts onto her bad shoulder to face him; she winces. He sympathy winces. “Woah woah woah hey,” he says as he pushes her back onto her back with two fingers. He crawls over her to her other side, “here, this way you can look at my beautiful face without being in any pain.”

She smiles softly.

“Really? I set you up there!” It’s hard to believe she wouldn’t spin that into calling him ugly.

She still has a slight smile but her face has gone intense and the tiniest bit sad. The two stare at each other for a very long, very silent 20 seconds. As though that was the final conversation they needed to have.

Penelope offers quietly, “this is nice.”

Schneider responds after a moment, “yeah. It is.”

Another very long silence rolls in before Schneider sits up and forward, laughing with his elbows on his knees. All she can see is the back of him as he shakes his head. A little annoyed, she sits up, too, and scoots forward to be next to him.

“What?” She asks, abruptly, though a little because she just wants in on the one-man joke.

He still smiles and chuckles and gives himself the tiniest might-as-well shrug before saying, “oh, I just  _ really _ wanna kiss you.” He gestures at her incredulous face, “I mean,” and then at her body, “so badly.” He takes off his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose and, when he’s put them back on, he sees she’s smiling at him. Her million watt smile. 

Now she looks at him. His face, down his chest, to the hand he’s leaning on. He’s looking down at the hand, too, as she places her own over it. 

They both exhale and look up at each other,

 

 

And they race to meet in the middle.


	2. Uh Oh

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Schneider and Penelope deal with just the start of the ~aftermath~.

“Soooo. That was new,” Schneider says while looking for his shirt.

“Mhmmmm,” Penelope responds, internally screaming and already back in the shirt and boxers.

He stops and stands upright to examine her face. “So I guess we decided we’re going with the let’s-both-be-really-weird-about-this plan.”

“Yep!” She smiles at that. “What were the next steps of the plan?”

“Well, we covered not knowing how to talk about it… how about next you run out of here, I pretend this meant nothing as I embrace all my defense mechanisms, and then I never come down for dinner again?” He sees she’s finally looking him in the eyes while she laughs so he continues, “and in two years I invite you to my wedding to a supermodel and your heart can’t take it.”

“Schneider!” She playfully kicks his legs with her toes. “Okay so forreal what should we do next?”

He tries to chew back his smile and puts on his best _Mission Impossible_ voice: “Definitely Step 1, you’re gonna want to abandon your work clothes in my hamper because I’m getting really into bouldering in Joshua Tree and my outdoor athletic wear is RANK.” He leans over to pick a deeply sweat-stained climbing glove off the top of the dresser. “See?”

Penelope gags. “Stop with the show & tell! What is next? You get me some clothes from downstairs?”

He nods excitedly at his mission, now grabbing his slacks to put on to run down. Pretending he has a walkie-talkie in his hand, Schneider whisper-yells, “we’ll discuss our next moves when I return.” Noticing her now confused and maybe a little bit angry Penelope face, he brightly adds, “did that make you regret the sex?”

“Go!” She pushes him out of the room but she can’t help but giddily alternate between smile and yikes smile and yikes. Penelope goes into the living room to check her phone. _It’s almost 8 o’clock. It’s almost 8? How–_ Oh. _daaaamn_.

 

\--

Schneider walks into the Alvarez’s apartment where Alex and Elena are playing C.O.D. on the couch and Lydia is eating water crackers out of her purse in the kitchen. No one seems to notice he’s there so he quietly speed-walks through the whole place until he arrives at Pen’s room, rummages through her drawers and finds her sets of scrubs. _She is not afraid to clash! Wow_ . He grabs one of her alarming pairs, some socks, and _well, well, well_. He picks out two of what she calls her “after-dark bras,” stacks those on top, and walks right back out into the hall.

 

Still looking at the game, Alex asks, “So he–”

“Just stole a bunch of mom’s underwear? Yeah.” Elena finishes.

\--

 

“Schneider, you brought me a _choice_ of bras but no bottoms? I gotta crumple these boxers into my scrubs which already barely fit my ass?”

“Yeah, sorry…” He wasn’t sorry.

-

While Penelope is stuffing her auxiliary bra into her purse, there is a knock at the door.

Their eyes shoot open and she slips away into the bathroom.

Once she is safely hidden away, Schneider pulls open the apartment door and his gaze drops two feet to Lydia, with her pursed lips and all-knowing eyes.

She drags out in a croaky voice, “where is my doter?”

“She is still at work, huh? I haven’t–”

“So even Leslie doesn’t stay late but she do?”

The two can hear a soft “ _carajo_ ” before Penelope trudges into the room.

“¡ _Mentirosa_!” Lydia screams like she’s in a telenovela, “¿y por qué? And ju!” She turns to point dramatically at Schneider, “Ju are helpink her!”

 

Schneider and Penelope both knew _why_ they were lying but neither knew why they _had_ to lie. Penelope broke the silence first, “Mami, can I meet you downstairs in one minute?” She subtly gestures to Schneider and Lydia skeptically steps back into the hallway with her best _this-isn’t-over_ face. Penelope slowly closes the door to not get into one of their “I didn’t slam it on purpose!” fights from her childhood.

 

As soon as it’s closed, Penelope whips around to look at Schneider, who is also bug-eyed.

“ShitShitShitShit!"

“Do you think your mom would be more mad or less mad if she knew you were only lying because we are hiding a sexual encounter? Follow-up: if said encounter was with her beloved pre-approved sexy lumberjack neighbor?”

“To be honest, I didn’t get that far because I was thinking we would hide it until we had a chance to really talk.”

“Or at least do it again so we knew there were no take-backs.”

“Well, yeah, whichever came first.” She laughs but the thought did actually cross her mind. “Well, I don’t want any take-backs.”

“And what about a repeat?”

She smiles, “of course.”

"I do wanna ask you a really important question, first –because I’m assuming we’re _both_ going downstairs to talk to your mom and not actually going for Round #2 right this second– should I tell your mother to stop flirting with me? So you don’t get jealous?”

“Dios, _why_ did I think it was going to be important?”

He continues to joke while they head downstairs, “I just don’t want to have any serious discussions with _you_ before I really get a chance to talk to Lydia one-on-one.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter will be full of uncomfortable and very comfortable conversations.
> 
> I added the part about the water crackers because my abuelita is always eating those flower shaped tasteless water crackers and eating loose peanut chews? This show makes me feel so much less unique lmao


	3. Brujería

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first of many conversations.

“Wait, so what are we about to tell her? Game plan, Alvarez!”

“Damn I wish we did it like 4 times before we got caught so I was sure enough to just say ‘seeing each other’!”

“How bout we go upstairs, make it a sure thing, then come back down just to be safe.” He then puts his hands on his hips and fakes a heavy sigh, “or, we could just say you seduced me.”

“You don’t use the word _‘seduce’_ , and I won’t use the phrase _‘moment of weakness.’_ How ‘bout that?”

“Deal.” He resigns.

“So… ‘seeing each other’?”

“Well, is that what we’re doing or is that just what we’re telling her?” Schneider asks, looking genuinely confused.

Usually these conversations are nerve-racking for Penelope, but with Schneider, she knows he’s not going anywhere. It all feels less precarious. She thinks, _don’t tell him you recognize him as a co-parent._ “What do _you_ want?”

“What do **_you_ ** want?”

“I asked you first!” She points a ‘gotcha’ finger gun at him.

“Pen, y’know, sexin’ up my best friend is the highest tier imaginable, so word choice is really up to you.”

With an illegible expression and without breaking eye contact, she turns the knob.

 

\--

 

“I sent Alex and Elena to their rooms,” Lydia says somberly while they walk through the door.

“So, Mami, sit down.”

“Ju are going back to the war. I Ñew it!”

“No, Mami! Just sit down so we can all talk. Us _three_.” Penelope swirls her finger in the air to lasso Schneider into the conversation.

“We are going condominimos! I Ñew it! _Aaayy_!” She brings the back of her hand to her forehead as though she were about to faint.

“Okay, _juststopguessing_! How do those even tie in with any of the facts you have?” Penelope guides her mother to the kitchen table and Schneider, still not sure what to contribute, follows, too.

All three sit like mass.

 

“So.” Penelope clears her throat while she tries to figure out what she should even tell her mom. _Alright start off with a classic:_ “I don’t want to lie to you.” _Okay, audience engagement is high, keep going._ “…I don’t want to lie to you.”

“You said that al–“

“I know, Schneider!” She bites.

 

He swoops in; _maybe he will have more of an idea what to say_ , “Lydia, Lupe and I…”

“We have an arrangement where I can use his place to get some peace because I’m so tired after work!”

Schneider and Penelope stare at each other in a sort of fine-that-works-for-now expression.

“So ju’ll be going ober there for hours ebery day?”

Schneider starts to laugh and quickly turns it into a cough and mimes that he’ll get up for a glass of water. Neither woman thinks that was subtle.

 

“Lupita,” Lydia starts to sound hurt, “why won ju jos tell me? I know Eschneider don bring anyone peace.”

Schneider comes back with a glass of water and sits back down. In awkward conversations, it’s always best to have something in your hands. Even if it’s room temperature LA tap.

“Mami, can’t I just hang out with my friend Schneider and it not be a big thing? We just wanted to hang out today.”

Her face drops to skepticism: “Ju don see him enough already?” She looks between the two, “e-sonthing fishy is goin on! In _Law & Order, _ e-Sam Waterson sontines says the rrroom is a lil too clean, so _clean_ it is suspechos!” She mimes slamming a gavel (acting as though that were a verbatim quote and Waterson was even a judge), “Y ahorita ju are not fighting.” She holds out a curled arthritic finger and wiggles it in between them, “Fishy, no! _e-seeeexy_!”

 

Schneider chokes out the water he was holding in his mouth to avoid answering questions and, after 8 seconds of coughing, he looks up to see Lydia. Staring down the barrel of her angry painted nail, he raises his voice an octave to ask, “is she using brujería on me?” He yelps out, “it’s a _really_ bad time for me to get cursed. I’m already getting audited and my salamander has been gone for at least two days! A curse would just be the cherry on top, huh!?”

Penelope puts her hand on his shoulder to shut him up, “Schneider, we will definitely circle back to everything you just said;” she turns to Lydia, “Mami, relájate por un minuto okay.”

Schneider speaks mostly to himself, “I broke a promise to him.”

 

With that, Lydia stares with a disappointed face, “Lupe, is this to do with,” and she leans in to whisper, “ _las drogas_?”

“Mami.”

Lydia continues, “¿It's a lil sonthing para la renta?” And she rubs two fingers together for the ~money~ move with her eyebrows raised.

“Mami, nooo. You don’t think that this whole conversation is proving my point? That I need some frickin’ space from you?!” Penelope uses her _I-give-up_ hand raise.

The two women go silent in a fuming stare stand-off.

After a moment, Schneider reaches his hand to place it over Lydia’s tiny fist on the table. “You know she doesn’t wanna hurt you, Lydz.”

“I’m right here!” Penelope’s hands are in the air again.

 

Schneider continues, “your daughter and I are,” and he holds up his hands in air quotes, “ _seeing each other_.”

While her mother avoids their gaze and stares dramatically at the table, Penelope catches eye contact with him and mouths, _what’s with_ **_this??_ **, and she aggressively air-quotes back in his direction.

 

Lydia slowly raises her head and purses her lips, giving each of them a personal two-second stare. “Ju knooow… maybe ju are perfec for eashother.”

* * *

 

\- Back upstairs, after checking in on Alex & Elena - 

 

Penelope mimics her mother, “ _~maybe ju are perfect for each other~_. What the heck is THAT?”

Schneider paces quickly around the room, “she’s in our heads, man!” His voice cracks, “she’s in my freakin’ HEAD!”

“So is this a mistake?” Penelope asks, flicking her index finger between them. She talks now much quieter to herself, as though she’s doing a math problem. “Does my mother’s approval mean I can’t want this now? OR is it all a little game to throw _me_ off _my_ game?”

Schneider, eavesdropping on her private conversation, chimes in, “so… do you want to stop, then?”

She looks up at his classic whatever-would-make-you-happy face.

 

* * *

...  


“I think we’re getting even better at that,” she laughs, putting on scrubs for the 3rd time in one day.

“Teamwork makes the dream work!” Schneider raises his hand for a high five.

Penelope rolls her eyes. “I might as well at this point.” She gives him a high five and heads out the door.


	4. Yeah, You Know

Penelope sometimes treats herself to sleeping until 7:30 on Saturday mornings. This Saturday, she wakes up to four voices in the kitchen. Padding slowly down the hall, she can hear Schneider and Elena talking about “the environmental racism inherent in fracking” and Alex and Mami staging a snapchat. She stands just far back enough in the hall that she can see all their heads moving around.

If it were any other group of people she loved, she might feel left out that they didn’t wake her, but this. This is  _ because _ of her.  _ Mami, my son, my daughter, my. Schneider. _ Her face feels warm and she wells up a little. Before moving into plain view, she quickly wipes her eyes.

As she steps into the light from the kitchen window, everyone turns their heads.

Lydia gives her a “bueno’dia.’”

“Mom, Schneider is gonna take us to hike Mt. Baldy,” Alex says, as he points in the general vicinity of the mountain backdropping LA.

“It’s too early to fight and you all look really excited,” she smiles then adds flatly, “but no, you are not going to hike to the snow-capped peak of a mountain this weekend.”

The three of them deflate while Lydia says, “I toll’ you…” to Schneider on her way out of the kitchen.

Elena protests, “well, we couldn’t go anywhere on a  _ Friday night _ because of your fight with Abuelita…”

Alex, unable to resist the bait, “ _ we _ ? Where were you gonna go? Syd’s  _ school _ – I mean -  _ house _ ?”

Sometimes a really difficult part of being a parent is  _ not _ laughing at harsh sibling slams. “Yup, yup, uh huh, I hear ya.” She pauses and walks through them to stand next to Schneider, “the last sporty hobby this man had before climbing had him using a helmet in his own apartment. You know why Mt. Baldy has snow on top and down here I got pit stains?” She gives a crooked eyebrow rhetorical survey of the room.

Schneider answers meekly, “cause it’s so bi–”

“Cuz it’s so big!” Penelope finishes before she slides in front of him to get a view of the stove that has four mini pancakes cooking, about to be added to a comically full plate and then followed by a still voluminous bowl of batter. She says nothing but turns around to stare straight up at Schneider, disapprovingly.

“...we were carbo-loading before the big hike.” He adds, embarrassed, but everyone is smiling.

 

“Well then, let’s eat.” Penelope shifts out of his way so the pancakes don’t burn and absentmindedly puts her hand on the small of his back while she moves around him to store the remaining batter.

Once it is wrapped –in the aluminum foil she found balled up near the oven mitts– and put away, she comes back next to Schneider to share the view of his expert flipping skills. Her hand falls right back in place, which goes unnoticed by… no one.

Alex and Elena, instead of saying anything, independently contextualize this tiny change with the shift of the tides lately since Schneider’s break-up and the underwear and the fight and…  _ ew _ . Both of their faces scrunch with disgust as they vacate the kitchen to join Abuelita at the table, who sits there with a matter-of-fact look on her face and her nostrils flared, “is trrue.”

 

Everyone at the table is reminded of the sensation of seemingly never-ending flights on empty stomachs, with every giggle and voiced (but, by the grace of God, unintelligible) whisper serving as the turbulence.

Elena breaks the silence and whispers incredulously. “Okay, that is bone-chilling.”

-

Schneider and Penelope walk into the room, thankfully having divided the toppling pile onto two plates. Schneider runs back for the utensils and individual plates. Slamming an Aunt Jemima bottle down on the table, Penelope brags, “I talked him out of bringing down that chi-chi Canadian crap.” Nobody smiles back or looks excited to eat.  _ If this was about the hiking trip, they’d at least look me in the eyes _ .

 

“So…” Penelope loses the energy she got from parenting the kids and then giggling with Schneider. “Y’all know right?”

*Mhhmm* rings in unison.

For the first time in his life, Schneider reads the room immediately upon entering it. “Oh.” He sits down.  


 

Alex turns to him and asks, “what exactly are your intentions with my mother?”

“I mean,” he turns to Penelope to mouth behind his hands, “ _ how much do I say? _ ”

Before anyone answers, Elena asks, “when did this start?”

Schneider feels a flush coming on and holds his face in his hands. “AAgh. Last night.”

Elena says what they’re all thinking, “I hope you mean that you talked it out last night in an emotional reveal.”

This time Penelope mouths to Schneider behind her hands, “ _ I’m gonna kill you. _ ”

Schneider, also behind his hands, but now forgetting to mouth, “honesty’s the best policy.”

“Not when you’re a parent,” she angry-stage-whispers back.

 

They join the table discussion again.

Elena interrupts before they can begin, “I’d like to just acknowledge the fact that we heard all that.”

Schneider takes that as a cue to go into tunnel vision on some mini-pancakes.

“They’re,” Lydia raises her hands in air-quotes, “ _ seeing eashother _ .”

Alex chimes in, “so… you’re sleeping together?”

Schneider begs his salivary amylase to begin to break down his overstuffed mouth so he doesn’t choke again or worse, have to release the food into a napkin like the way snakes vomit up mice.

“Alex!” Penelope warns.

“C’mon, we’re all adults here.”

“No, Alex, we’re  _ not _ .” She points back at him.

Finally in a position to speak and breathe again, Schneider chews through while he speaks, “C’mon guys,” he swallows a very large chunk, “ack,” and continues, “you know we love each other, this is not that different.”

Penelope looked at the side of his face while he spoke to her family. _He wasn’t wrong. Neither of them were ever pining or waiting around; they were just sort of irrevocably tied. She had her flesh and blood in this place and he put his whole world in this building._

She clears her throat and barely pulls her eyes away in time, “yeah, you know we love each other.”


	5. Down to It

After a day at the nearby park, a huge let’s-forget-this-morning’s-conversation feast (plátanos maduros, arroz con pollo, ordered-in pizza), a nice let’s-forget-this-morning’s-conversation 11pm curfew, and seeing that everyone gets to sleep, the two sneak upstairs. Penelope and Schneider watch ancient  _ Flavor of Love _ reruns on the couch. “I wanna complain that there’s nothing on at 2 in the morning, but I used to really love this show,” she grins giddily. Schneider, who started the night wishing they were watching  _ Planet Earth _ , now hangs onto every word.

She gets one last look at his expression before turning off the TV to chat. When the screen goes black, he looks over at her.

“So.” She begins. Nervous, her raspy voice whistles a little.  


“So.” He tentatively repeats back. He thinks, ‘ _ this could be frisky or it could be serious. Stay tuned before acting, Schneiderman _ .’

“At the risk of sounding 16 again,” she already regrets not planning a script, “ _ whatarewefrickin’doing _ ?”

He pauses for a moment and she knows he is squashing down his first eight 'hilarious' ideas of what to say before responding, “Pen, what exactly do you wanna know?”

“I wanna know if I am taking things too seriously. Or not seriously enough, I’m not sure. Things like if I can… kiss you when we’re not, y’know,” she cartoonishly clicks her tongue toward the bedroom.

“Oh, I  _ know _ .” He beams back at her.

“Or, uh, take you places? Introduce you to people? I don’t know what people  _ do!” _ She raises her hands, regretting even bringing it up, “but I wanna know if that’s what  _ we’re _ gonna do.”

 

“Like… date?” After he hears himself, he makes a childish  _ yuck _ face like the word tastes bad.

“I mean,  _ date _ – but we’d be kicking off at our  _ a’thousandth _ date.”

“Pen, I know you like to exercise sexual caution, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and say you can kiss a guy by your  _ thousandth _ date…” He pauses for a laugh, doesn’t get one, and continues, “but I know what you mean; you’re asking if I should start coming to big family functions,” he patronizingly puts his arm around her shoulder, “or maybe one day down the line, I’ll make a good impression on the ol’ mother-in-law and maybe you and I will have kids and I’ll take them to baseball games or talk them through the coming out process–”

“I get it! We’re already doing the rest.”

“Pen, all that,  _ that’s _ the romantic stuff. I’ve always thought the word  _ dating _ means it’s the thing leading up to something. But we’ve already got all the somethings.” He uses his thumb to indicate downstairs. She puts her feet up onto his lap and sinks deep into the couch while she digests that. (She thinks:  _ wow, he has a way with words. _ ) Schneider, feeling chatty, adds, “I was already  _ frequenting _ the bakery, now I’m just gettin’ the sweets.” ( _ Aaand, he ruined it. _ )

_ Este cabrón _ .

“So what is this to you?”

“ _ This,” _ he motions between them, “is us finally putting our movie star bodies and creative minds to good use. The final, inevitable,  _ sexy _ frontier,” when he senses her impatience, he makes a theatrical eye roll and adds, “ _ exclusively _ .” 

“A-HA,  **there** it is! You’re gonna give me my own creepy custom snow globe,” she teases him by toe-poking at his legs.

“Actually, I’m pretty sure the first one is the paper anniversary.” Schneider pulls her to fully sit up then kisses her right behind the ear.

_ When will it not be weird to see this side of him? It feels a little like invading his privacy, seeing him this intimate. _

 

“Does it scare you?” (She thinks:  _ cause it scares me! _ ).

He pretends not to hear her and asks loudly, “did you ask, ‘ _ do  _ **_I_ ** _ scare you? _ ’? Yes,” his voice cracks, “you really do scare me sometimes–” He looks back at her, almost as though he’s surprised she had so little faith in him and gives her a little affectionate jostle: “No, c’mon, loving you is easy and it’s free.”

“Oye, you make me sound like a pop-up ad,” she teases. She chews on her lip and smiles down at their hands – which aren’t touching, but she squints her eyes to sort of blur them.

“Well,” he switches to an announcer voice and blinks his hands to mimic a spam ad, “it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity! Act Now!”

_ Este. Hombre. _ Right before landing a smiling kiss, Penelope asks, “do I really scare you?” He nods. She stops a quarter inch away, “just checking,” and kisses him.

-

After about two minutes, she peels herself away, “okay one more question.”

“Okay, Riddler, but this is your last one of the night or I’m getting the Scantron out.”

“What are you thinking right now?”

“Well, as everyone says, I’m a tall drink of water–”

"–who says that besides my mom?" She makes the scrunched  _ blech _ face that Schneider’s performative confidence so often calls for.

Feeling slighted, he speaks more pointedly, “–so then that would make you,” he closes one eye and looks through the small space he makes between two hands, “that little glass on an old person’s bedside table that they put their dentures in.”

“Seriously!”

“Okay, but this one is serious.” He dramatically swallows his spit, “should we just never do it at your place?”

Without skipping a beat, Penelope responds, “Yeah, truly never. Never. 18 hours ago, my 16 year old son asked me about my sex life in front of my daughter and my  _ MOTHER _ .” She points at her head, “That took a year off my life. I am scheduling a consultation on a lobotomy!”

-

There’s a silence after they embarrassingly remember the morning and she is back to her thoughts; _ he addressed a lot of her anxieties, but did she address any of his? Does he know how  _ **_she_ ** _ feels? _

“Hey, Pat,” she tests out.

“If you get to call me  _ Pat _ , I get to call you  _ Penelupita _ again! But go on...”

“ **Deal**. Hey,  _ Schneider _ , you know, I’m really happy. I mean, I like it when you come over and I like seeing you at all hours and I like our talks – even when members of the cast from  _ Young and the Pants-less _ interrupted. You know that, right?”

“Part of me knew that,” he nudges her shoulder, “but it’s nice to hear.”

“I trust you with the kids and with my–well, my everything, really.”

“...You said ‘ _ the _ kids.’”

“What?”

“You said ‘I trust you with  _ the _ kids,’ not ‘I trust you with  _ my _ kids.’” He pretends to hit a buzzer and raises his arms over his head, “you see me as a co-parent! No take-backs!”

“Ay,  **Dios** ,” she puts her face in her hands, “I think I  _ do _ .”


	6. Over Chalupas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dr. B gives Schneider some advice on his next life steps.

A week later, while everyone cleans up and returns to their rooms after dinner, Schneider pulls Leslie aside. “Hey, mind if we have a father-son chat sesh on the fire escape?”

Leslie beams back, “of course,  _ son _ ,” he says loud enough for everyone to hear, “I’ll meet you out there to have a  _ father-son talk _ !” (Elena would never tell anyone, but she thinks it’s really sweet.)

After finally spider-ing his long limbs through the window and unfolding some beach chairs, Schneider barely waits for Leslie to sit down before he begins, “Okay, Papa L, I need some serious guidance.”

“Lay it on me, man.”

“Lately, I’m sort of awakening these feelings and it feels like there’s no going back–”

“For Penelope.”

“Yeah, doc. I don’t know how to put it, exactly–”

“She’s the love of your life.” Dr. B remembers a one-sided conversation he had once.

“But she’s not, though. It’s not like  _ that _ . She’s in my _whole_ life; the love of it, yeah, but all the rest; she’s taken over every part of me that I thought would be unloved or unseen. Like I have no shadows left. Like I’m on the sun.” He rises to his feet to pace but sits back down when he remembers the confined space.

Leslie silently wipes tears from his eyes and then lets out a single yelp-sob that can be heard by everyone inside. 

Schneider continues, “I’m not even sure what I’m asking, if I’m asking advice or what. Maybe I don’t understand why it’s me… and not some  _ other _ gorgeous and charming guy who  _ doesn’t _ have my history.”

“Son, I’ll tell you what. You are everything to that family. I was even a little jealous at first,” he laughs. “Penelope probably wonders why  _ she _ deserves someone who has been every kind of surrogate or service or friend that she has needed for so long. You’re not a spot- _ holder _ in that family, Pat,” he talks much louder now and punctuates his words by pointing into the apartment, “the spot there with them is for  _ you _ .” He sets a big hand on Schneider’s shoulder.

He looks over at him, “so, what do I do next?”

* * *

  
  


**––TACO BELL––**

_-the next day-_

 

Penelope pinches and teases an uncharacteristically quiet Schneider, “so how come you’re treating me like a queen?”  _ Why is he so anxious today? _ “Are you taking me to the Taco Bell drive-thru thinkin’ you’ll get lucky? Because I have to tell you, Schneider... you will.” 

He smiles slightly and turns to her at that, “I have a whole thing planned, actually!” Now he starts to break into a little smugness.

“Oh?” She snakes her arm up behind him in the driver’s seat and plays with his hair. “Go on.”

“Well, I’m taking us to Angels Point to watch the sunset over the city.”

“So that’s why you were being really annoying about being in the car by 4:55!”

“We’re on a schedule!” He defensively responds.

“You’re taking me out for synthetic Mexican food and to look at the sunset?” She asks, genuinely touched.

Schneider just smiles to himself, knowing that he did well. After a silence – and just one car away from being able to read the big menu – he asks, “what are you thinking about?”

Penelope immediately answers, “oh, I’m def’nily gonna get something with ‘Supreme’ in the name.”

 

* * *

 

“Y’know? This is nice.” She says, sitting on the grass next to about a million couples of different ages. “I’m actually a real sucker for this touristy stuff.”

Schneider feels a little weak looking at her incredible smile. They both see the elderly couple (that age that Alex refers to as “ _ deep old _ ”) seated in front and over to the right of them. When the woman puts her hand over her husband’s on the grass, both Schneider’s and Penelope’s stomachs fill with hot acid. Penelope wonders:  _ can your organs blush? _

While trying to breathe down his heart from palpitating, Schneider angles himself so he can speak right into her ear: “wanna do that?”

She turns her head just slightly, almost certain what he means but knowing the risk if she’s wrong, “do what?”

He shifts against her and nudges her. Peeling her eyes away from the pink and smoggy skyline, she sees what actually nudged her: a small and silver square box. He pinches its side buttons and it snaps open.

“...That’s my mother’s ring.”  _ ¿quéestápasando? _

“Yeah–”

“You have my mother’s ring. _Mami_ gave you this?”

He smiles, distractedly proud of Lydia’s trust, then remembers the task: “so, what do you say? Penelope Francisca del Carmen Riera Inclán Ruiz Maribona de Alvarez, do you wanna get all gray and wrinkled with me?”

Her eyes tear up while she smiles. “Hell yeah, I’m down.”

While he’s in the middle of sliding the diamond on her finger, he whispers, “not to change the subject,” at which she’s mad but unsurprised, “but you can see the lights on in our building right now.”

Angels Point looks down over all of Echo Park if you look in the direction of the actual sunset (everyone’s always  _ so _ focused on the LA skyline). Penelope leans on his shoulder a bit and imagines everyone talking in the living room and all she can think is that she wishes she was there. Or they were all here. In fact, she's probably never felt so homesick in her life.  


“Schneider,” she turns to look at him right in the eyes, “wanna go home?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I loved writing this story for a million reasons but one of them definitely was because I live in SoCal and know all the cute stuff to do lol

**Author's Note:**

> give my ig a follow because I'm a cute struggling artist @ jdmwild.


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